Team:Heidelberg/hp/scientists
What is synthetic biology
What’s there better than asking those successfully working in synthetic biology for many years?
We embarked on realizing a video project that, for the first time, collected the opinions of renowned synthetic biologists on crucial questions about the field they (and we) work in. It has been challenging to recruit them for this project, but eventually we managed to convince several of them to share with us their thoughts on synthetic biology.
The project was structured this way: we sent personalized emails to invite very famous synthetic biologists to participate in the video project. We sent them a list of questions (Table 1) from which to choose, and asked them to film themselves while replying to one of these questions.
| Can you define synthetic biology? |
| How does synthetic biology impact society? |
| What has been the biggest struggle you have had working on synthetic biology ? |
| Throughout the years how did your opinion on synthetic biology change? Did you accomplish something that you thought would never be possible ? |
| What is the biggest risk associated to synthetic biology? |
| Which is the best way in your opinion to educate the new generations in synthetic biology? |
| How far is a future where synthetic biology applications are part of everyday life? |
| What would you say to convince a student to undertake studies in synthetic biology? |
| What are the qualities that distinguish a synthetic biologist from other scientists? |
| What distinguishes synthetic biology from other disciplines? |
Beatrix Suess (Technical University Darmstadt, Germany)
What would you say to convince a student to undertake studies in synthetic biology?
“Synthetic Biology is characterized by its enormous interdisciplinarity, bringing together scientists from different disciplines. […] I feel that it is necessary to implement this thinking in the curriculum of our universities.”
Luis Serrano (Design of Biological Systems, Barcelona, Spain)
Can you define synthetic biology?
“For me synthetic biology differs from biotechnology that it uses rational engineering and design.”
Victor De Lorenzo (Centro National de Biotechnología, Madrid, Spain)
Throughout the years how did your opinion on synthetic biology change? Did you accomplish something that you thought would never be possible?
“My view of synthetic biology has changed in the last few years from being just a mere extention of molecular genetics […] into something that allows us to understand and also to reprogram biological systems with a degree of predictability.”
It was very interesting to us to find out whether other renowned scientists working in other fields could be able to at least answer the simple question “what is synthetic biology?”. We, therefore, tried to involve other non-synthetic biologists in our video project. Some of them found the time to reply showing interest in the project, but eventually did not get to the point to really contribute a video due to their tight schedule. To bypass the problem of having to ask people per mail and not in person, we had the idea to interview speakers that visited a conference here in Heidelberg. We were surprised to see how well they could explain concepts related to synthetic biology!! Yet, to be honest, the conference was on systems biology, a field very close to synthetic biology, so it is perhaps not too surprising that they showed such high competence in this topic.
Eytran Ruppin (University of Maryland, USA)
How does synthetic biology impact medicine?
“Synthetic Biology is at a stage[…] where there is a lot of promise or a lot of hype and yet you need to deliver.”
Gaudenz Danuser (Harvard University, Boston, USA)
Which is the best way in your opinion to educate the new generations in synthetic biology?
“Synthetic Biology is happening and therefore we need students who can do it and critically think about it.”
Ioannis Xenarios (University of Lausanne, Switzerland
How does synthetic biology impact society?
“A better access to a certain type biotechnology products at a cost that is reasonable. And ultimately, […] help mankind take the next challenge.”
Philippe Bastien (Max-Planck Institute of Molecular Physiology, Dortmund, Germany)
What would you say to convince a student to undertake studies in synthetic biology?
“I would try to convince you that curiosity is what makes it really fascinating.”
Roy Wollmann (University of California, San Diego, USA)
How far is a future where synthetic biology applications are part of everyday life?
“Tremendous effect on the scientific community: The availability of new tools […] will open up a whole new field of experiments that we can do that we weren’t able to do before.”
Ulricke Gaul (Ludwig-Maximilians University, Munich, Germany)
What is the biggest risk associated to synthetic biology?
“There is always the danger when you create something new that has never existed before, that if you release it into the world at large that it might harm something.”
Uri Alon (Weizmann Institute of Science, Rechovot, Israel
How far is a future where synthetic biology applications are part of everyday life?
“It’s hard for me to believe that the century will end without a profound incorporation of understanding of biology into everyday’s life.”
Walter Kolch (University College Dublin, Ireland)
What are the qualities that distinguish a synthetic biologist from other scientists?
“A broad way of thinking and an open way of thinking, […] you also need to be inventive and actually finding the right applications. You need to be an allrounder.”
Beyond the systems biologists, we actually received written answers to our questions (Table 1) from the director general of the EMBL, Dr. Ian Mattaj. He showed quite some knowledge of what synthetic biology is, and gave us some interesting points of views, such as the feeling that synthetic biology applications are already pervasive in our daily life (we would not have expected this statement!). Here you find all his replies:
Q: Do you know what synthetic biology is?
A: Yes
Q: How does synthetic biology impact society in your opinion?
A: Synthetic Biology will lead to the way that many types of “manufacturing” are done, in the widest sense of the word. This has both the potential for good, for example in easing shortages or developing processes that produce fewer pollutants or unwanted side-effects, but will also change how some people work.
Q: Throughout the years did your opinion on synthetic biology change?
A: No
Q: Did you hear of great accomplishments in the field that you thought would never be possible?
A: Thus far not. There was always a very large potential and so nothing I have seen has gone beyond the obviously possible so far.
Q: What is the biggest risk associated to synthetic biology?
A: I would say a lack of acceptance in society caused by a lack of information that is broadly accessible to enable members of the public to assess risk (cf GMO debate).
Q: How far is a future where synthetic biology applications are part of everyday life?
A: It is here now.
Q: Would you support students to undertake studies in synthetic biology?
A: Yes, there have been PhD students in EMBL already who have carried out projects that would be defined as synthetic biology.
Discussion
In performing this video project, we learnt a lot about how to approach famous and busy scientists, how they reason and how they feel about synthetic biology. In listening to their inspiring words, we got even more enthusiastic about synthetic biology and feel compelled to positively impact society in the future with our innovative ideas. It would have been fantastic to be able to collect more information on the opinion of scientists totally outside of the field, but this was somehow not possible. While the answers we got from Ian Mattaj clearly show that scientists working in unrelated field can have an opinion on synthetic biology, we should consider that the EMBL is a research institute where synthetic biology has been present. We fear that most scientists working in institutes where synthetic biology projects were never performed would not be able to define synthetic biology or would fail to see the difference between synthetic biology and biotechnology (well, we saw how for instance even some of the system biologists we interviewed still spoke of synthetic biology as biotechnology, so this distinction seems to be fuzzy even for those working in closely related field!). Synthetic biologists have still to go a long way to explain their approaches and goals to other researchers and to the lay public. We think that the iGEM foundation, by pushing teams to perform human practice projects during the iGEM competition, strongly accelerates the spread of knowledge on this fascinating new field of research and pushes us students to spend time reflecting on how important it is to explain what we do to the outside world.